23.

If you know me then you know 23 is my number. Not necessarily my lucky number, it’s just my number. I see it everywhere I go. It’s in my address, my month and day of my birth (9+14), and other weird little things. Growing up I would always find 23 in the world and relate it back to me somehow. I would count and manipulate numbers until I got to 23. Was it a fun past time or a creepy obsession? You can pick!

Anywho today, on January 23, I go back to Duke to have scans, doctors appointments, and more bloodwork done before my first treatment on the 6th. I have been feeling very anxious about this appointment I feel like I find a new tumor on my body once a week, that’s only what I can feel, I am scared to know what lies beneath the skin and tissue.

However, today I had all my anxiety disappear. With the help of a friend and the number 23.

The story started yesterday, I was staying late at school to prepare for my sub teacher. A dear friend was in my classroom helping me staple all of the work together and organize it. She got up to leave, then all of the sudden one of my student laptops started playing music. ** Side note: the kids shut down and close the computers everyday before they leave**

We both freeze and look at the closed computers and get a tad freaked out. Then the music stops. I know that music, it’s from a math game the kids play called Prodigy… Just remember the name Prodigy. I finish up at school and go home. I crawl in bed after an exhausting day, my phone is charging on the nightstand beside me. Laying face down in the pillows I hear my phone start playing a show, the words that were said was ”this is your destiny”. I froze and looked my phone quickly grabbed it, and closed all my apps trying to find the noise and stop it… That was the extra sprinkle of creepy, that I needed to realize someone was trying to comfort me.

But who!?!?!

This morning I sat at the kitchen table telling my mom about the 2 events from last night.

And then realized this was the time of year that Meredith got really sick and was put into hospice. I googled her name to read an article or two.

Immediately saw that on January 23, 2014 Meredith was told she only had a month left to live.

5 years apart we are both going to the doctors. Both anxious, however Meredith has made her way back to show me not to be anxious.

In my overly positive mind this is what I have taken from Merediths signs. Meredith was trying to tell me its different now and to stop comparing my diagnosis to hers.

It’s 5 years later, 5 years of new medicine, 5 years of new medical opportunities, 5 years with our awesome doctors, and 5 years to a longer survival rate.

Today 23 is in my favor. Below is the article for Meredith. I love this article and the way it’s written.

https://goheels.com/news/2014/2/24/209415803.aspx